Michelle Moran's Guest Post + Giveaway!!

What an absolute treat- Michelle Moran author of Nefertiti (read my review here), The Heretic Queen and now: Cleopatra’s Daughter is here to grace my blog with a wonderful post!



This lady is brilliant, extremely talented, beautiful and the sweetest person ever! What an author! Michelle Moran’s books can literally sweep you off your feet, and capture you into another historical dimension.

Today Michelle writes a post that answers the famous question that has fans everywhere so curious to know…

GUEST POST
Why Cleopatra’s daughter?

It began with a dive. Not the kind of dive that people take into swimming pools, but the kind where you squeeze yourself into a wetsuit and wonder just how tasty your rump must appear to passing sharks now that it looks exactly like an elephant seal. My husband and I had taken a trip to Egypt, and at the suggestion of a friend, we decided to go to Alexandria and do a dive to see the remains of Cleopatra’s underwater city. Let it be known that I had never done an underwater dive before, so after four days with an instructor (and countless questions like, Will there be sharks? How about jellyfish? If there is an earthquake, what happens underwater?) we were ready for the real thing.

We drove to the Eastern Harbor in Alexandria. Dozens of other divers were already there, waiting to see what sort of magic lay beneath the waves. I wondered if the real thing could possibly live up to all of the guides and brochures selling this underwater city, lost for thousands of years until now. Then we did the dive, and it was every bit as magical as everyone had promised. You can see the rocks which once formed Marc Antony’s summer palace, come face to face with Cleopatra’s towering sphinx, and take your time floating above ten thousand ancient artifacts, including obelisks, statues, and countless amphorae. By the time we had surfaced, I was Cleopatra-obsessed. I wanted to know what had happened to her city once she and Marc Antony had committed suicide. Where did all of its people go? Were they allowed to remain or were they killed by the Romans? What about her four children?

It was this last question which surprised me the most. I had always believed that all of Cleopatra’s children had been murdered. But the Roman conqueror Octavian had actually spared the three she bore to Marc Antony: her six-year-old son, Ptolemy, and her ten-year-old twins, Alexander and Selene. As soon as I learned that Octavian had taken the three of them for his Triumph in Rome, I knew at once I had my next book. This is how all of my novels seem to begin – with a journey, then an adventure, and finally, enormous amounts of research for what I hope is an exciting story.


***Michelle is graciously offering one SIGNED copy of Cleopatra’s Daughter to the lucky winner of this giveaway!

1- Please post your comment and email address for one entry.
2- Tweet about this for an extra chance and send me the tweet!

****Please NOTE: Michelle is hosting several contests on her website. Please feel free to spread the word, or enter any of the contests. The prizes include signed copies of Cleopatra's Daughter, gold Cleopatra earrings, and Roman artefacts!!!

Thank you so much Michelle Moran!



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